Verizon has established a strategic relationship with Health Evolution Partners (HEP) which will promote the operator’s telecoms services to the firms in the US healthcare sector in which it invests.  Under a multi-year agreement Verizion Connected Healthcare Solutions, the company’s health IT practice group, will collaborate with HEP to “identify and work with companies to spur the development and adoption of advanced IT solutions and applications” in the healthcare sector. The kind of services that might be introduced to the firms as a result of the agreement include mobile health, telemedicine and health data management. HEP is described in the announcement as a healthcare buyout firm.

David Brailer, HEP’s chairman, told InformationWeek Healthcare that the firm has investments in almost 100 companies of  whose businesses a large share are data-driven, meaning they could benefit from Verizon’s services. He said the firms, which cover life sciences, health IT as well as healthcare delivery, tend to be fast-growing with US$50 million to US$200 million in annual revenues. Typically these companies have to manage an increasing dataload as well as supporting a mobile workforce that is working with patients remotely. Supplying a smartphone or tablet is “easy” he said.  What they really need is “an information architecture”, he told the publication.